The 1991 Redskins were as good or better than the 1985 Bears (1 Viewer)

[Assani Fisher]

1996 Packers were better than either team.

I really do love to debate(as I"m sure you can tell), so I really hope that you're looking for a legit debate and not just going to give your opinion with no reasoning like so many others have done. The 1996 Pack were a great team for sure...#1 in points scored and #1 in points allowed is mighty impressive. And their point differential of +246 is very good as well(although not as great as the 91 Skins).I really don't have any problem with the 96 Packers. Really the only thing that keeps them from my top tier is their 3 losses, all of which came in games they fully tried to win(no losses in "rest your starters week 16/17 games"). Thats a lot of losses for a team trying to be compared to the other greats. The 07 Pack were undefeated. The 89 49ers had 2 losses by 4 or 5 points COMBINED. The 91 Skins lost one very unlucky game by 3 points and then only lost a meaningless week 17 game. The 85 Bears had just one loss(albeit a pretty horrible one)......Three losses really sticks out like a sore thumb here. Furthermore its not like they lost 3 games by one or two points each either. They lost by 9, 7, and 15 points....maybe if they had lost all 3 games by less than a TD then I could consider them more carefully with the other greatest teams of all time. But I just can't do that as it is.I would be willing to listen to your argument though.

 

[pinequick]

A bit of non-sequiter:

I taught this guy in college.

That is all...

 

[Statcruncher]

Personally I don't know who the greatest team ever was, and I don't really care as it is unpossible to know. That being said I'm a Bears fan who still fondly remembers the '85 Bears as the best ever. And in that respect I feel the need to correct some things that I think are incorrect before I go back to bashing Cedric Benson.

As for criticizing who the Bears had to play in the the playoffs... They beat the Giants and Rams by a combined score of 45-0. The Bears had no control over who lined up against them... but they SHUT THEM BOTH OUT. And everyone remembers the 46-10 superbowl win.

You're misunderstanding my point. I'm not saying the Bears don't deserve full credit for winning the SB. I'm not saying that its their "fault" that there was a lack of other great teams that year. What I am saying is this:-There was a lack of other great teams that year

-Even taking that out of consideration, the Bears only played a .500 schedule

-None of this was the Bears fault. But when you consider it, you'd expect the Bears to dominate even more because of it. Therefore when you then consider that the Skins had a better point differential while playing a harder schedule and against more great teams it makes it even more impressive.

You can't control who is on the schedule, but you can control how dominate you are.

In '85 not counting the 15-1 Bears there were 10 teams that had at least 10 wins in the regular season. Throughout the regular season & playoffs Chicago fared pretty well. Teams that made the playoffs in '85 have a *.AFC

* Miami Dolphins 12-4 (Bears lose 24-38)

* Los Angeles Raiders 12-4

* New York Jets 11-5 (Bears win 19-6)

* New England Patriots 11-5 (Bears win 20-7 in season) (Bears win 46-10 in Super Bowl)

Denver Broncos 11-5

NFC

* Los Angeles Rams 11-5 (Bears win 24-0 in NFC Championship game)

* Dallas Cowboys 10-6 (Bears win 44-0)

* New York Giants 10-6 (Bears win 21-0 in the playoffs)

Washington Redskins 10-6 (Bears win 45-10)

* San Francisco 49ers 10-6 (Bears win 26-10)

Throughout the regular season and post season the Bears played 9 games against 8 teams (NE twice) that would make the playoffs. They went 8-1 and outscored them a combined 224 to 71. The Bears average score against playoff teams was 24 to 7, a 3 scores lead. In their 3 game playoff run Chicago scored 91 points and allowed only 10 points, a 30 to 3 average for a 4 score lead. Everyone has a unique definition, but I'm calling that dominant.

Also, I'd say going to San Fransisco and beating the Joe Montana 49ers, holding them to their lowest point total of the season counts for something.

That was a solid win for sure. But that 49ers team was not a great team at all that year. They were 10-6. If you want to argue that they were great THAT YEAR then be my guest.And I notice that every pro-Bears post has ignored the loss to Miami(or tried to write it off as a fluke which is just as silly). I'm putting this in bold because I would like a response. The Bears were thoroughly beaten in that game. The 91 Skins or 07 Pats when they had bad games would still play close games that could go either way. Why were the Bears unable to do that?

San Francisco being 15-1 and beating 14-2 Miami in the Superbowl the year before down? And of course I ignore the Bears sole black mark on the record. What do you expect me to say other than a team that made it to the Superbowl the year before handed the Bears their ###. They got killed, b-slapped, whatever you want to call it. I don't know why it happened but it did. The Bears had more than 1 bad game in '85, they just didn't lose the others. That being said you seem to imply the 14-2 Skins are better because they were more competitive in their 2 losses. Keep clinging to that, because I'll take a 1 game mental lapse blowout before I'd take 2 losses. And spare me the "meaningless" tag on one of the Skins losses. The Bears had home field throughout the playoffs locked up by week 14 (I can't remember if it was before or after the game though) so they could have tanked 2 or 3 games and called them "meaningless" but they didn't.

 

[phthalatemagic]

Personally I don't know who the greatest team ever was, and I don't really care as it is unpossible to know.

I agree

 

[Assani Fisher]

Statcruncher, thanks for your reply.....

Personally I don't know who the greatest team ever was, and I don't really care as it is unpossible to know.

Agreed that its impossible to know for sure. But I think its fun to speculate and debate for sure.

In '85 not counting the 15-1 Bears there were 10 teams that had at least 10 wins in the regular season. Throughout the regular season & playoffs Chicago fared pretty well. Teams that made the playoffs in '85 have a *.AFC* Miami Dolphins 12-4 (Bears lose 24-38)* Los Angeles Raiders 12-4* New York Jets 11-5 (Bears win 19-6)* New England Patriots 11-5 (Bears win 20-7 in season) (Bears win 46-10 in Super Bowl)Denver Broncos 11-5NFC* Los Angeles Rams 11-5 (Bears win 24-0 in NFC Championship game)* Dallas Cowboys 10-6 (Bears win 44-0)* New York Giants 10-6 (Bears win 21-0 in the playoffs)Washington Redskins 10-6 (Bears win 45-10)* San Francisco 49ers 10-6 (Bears win 26-10)Throughout the regular season and post season the Bears played 9 games against 8 teams (NE twice) that would make the playoffs. They went 8-1 and outscored them a combined 224 to 71. The Bears average score against playoff teams was 24 to 7, a 3 scores lead. In their 3 game playoff run Chicago scored 91 points and allowed only 10 points, a 30 to 3 average for a 4 score lead.

Statistics can easily be manipulated. Thats why I hate it when ESPN shows a stat like "Player X is the only player to ever rush for 120+ yards and have 140+ yards receiving since Player Y did it 10 years ago" because the 120 and 140 are such random and arbitrary numbers that ESPN picked just so they could make their point look stronger. I am a much bigger fan of simply listing ALL the stats, taking a good look at them, and drawing conclusions based upon that. This is the same thing that I called out Chase for earlier in this thread: It seemed like he was trying to use fancy wording to make a team look better than it really was. To me all of this is intellectually dishonest.With all of that said, don't you think that the most complete measure of a teams' strength of schedule would be to simply look at the record of their opponents? Thats what I tried to do in my OP.Regarding the "there were no other dominant teams that year" point, I was very clear that I understood that what I was saying came across as very subjective and I wouldn't argue too much with those who disagreed. And I'll stick to that. I still agree with the poster that said that a QB who makes good decisions coupled with an o-line giving him time was the Bears big weakness. And when imagining the 85 Bears trying to play the 07 Pats, I can't help but think that the Pats would rape them when they left Moss in single coverage. But there were no teams that year that had the skills to exploit that(except perhaps the Dolphins). But, I won't continue on with this point. It was probably the weakest point of my OP and if you disagree then thats fine.

Everyone has a unique definition, but I'm calling that dominant.

The Bears were definitely dominant. As I said to another poster regarding the 96 Pack, when we evaluate these great teams we're really forced to nitpick to come up with reasons that one isn't as great as another. Please don't mistake my nitpicking for me thinking that the Bears weren't great. As I already said, they're in my top tier of teams during my lifetime.

San Francisco being 15-1 and beating 14-2 Miami in the Superbowl the year before down?

As was already said in this thread, a lot changes from year to year. Would you consider a win over the Saints this year to be a win over an elite team or a loss to the Packers this year to be a loss to a mediocre team?

And of course I ignore the Bears sole black mark on the record. What do you expect me to say other than a team that made it to the Superbowl the year before handed the Bears their ###. They got killed, b-slapped, whatever you want to call it. I don't know why it happened but it did.

I'm not sure what you mean by "of course I ignore it." We're trying to evaluate two great great teams, so this black mark is very very relevant and can't be ignored.

The Bears had more than 1 bad game in '85, they just didn't lose the others.

Agreed, no team plays perfect all year. I'm more concerned with the manner in which they lost. Theres a lot of variance and luck in sports. A close game can go either way. A team can have a 51% shot of winning every game and get lucky and go undefeated, while a team can be good enough to have a 80% chance of winning every game and happen to get unlucky and lose a bunch of games. So close games are tough to evaluate as one bounce of the ball or bad ref call could determine them. However blowouts are telling.

That being said you seem to imply the 14-2 Skins are better because they were more competitive in their 2 losses. Keep clinging to that, because I'll take a 1 game mental lapse blowout before I'd take 2 losses. And spare me the "meaningless" tag on one of the Skins losses.

I don't believe that you honestly believe this for one second. Your responded too reasonably and logically in your post up until this point for you to honestly believe it. The 1998 Broncos for example had everything wrapped up by week 15 and were set to play a Dolphins team that it was likely they'd play again in the playoffs. So they had a very vanilla game plan, rested their key players a bunch, and lost 31-21. A few weeks later they beat that team 38-3 in the playoffs.The 1991 Skins had beaten those Eagles 23-0 earlier in the season. Their key players were on the bench for the entire second half. Then when they playoffs started they went back to blowing everyone out.Those are not real losses, and its clear to everyone that they could've won those games had they wanted to.

The Bears had home field throughout the playoffs locked up by week 14 (I can't remember if it was before or after the game though) so they could have tanked 2 or 3 games and called them "meaningless" but they didn't.

Thats all fine and dandy. Different teams have different philosophies regarding this. Some believe that you should rest your key players and not risk injury. Others believe that the bye week will be enough rest and you should player your starters to stay fresh and focused. However, this philosophical difference does not change the skill level of the teams and its completely unfair to critisize one team as a worse team because they chose a different strategy regarding this.

 

[westbrook36]

The 91 Eagles would have won the Super Bowl if Cunningham didn't get hurt. Best defense ever.

 

[redman]

The 91 Eagles would have won the Super Bowl if Cunningham didn't get hurt. Best defense ever.

I don't necessarily agree with your statement, and I'd point out a lesser 'Skins beat them on the road in the 1990 playoffs in payback for the "bodybag game", and that was with RC. But that was definitely a scary defense and it was definitely a severe loss for them when Cunningham was injured. That line was superior IMHO to the '85 Bears' line, though I like the Bears' LB's better.

I think it was early in 1992 when Jerome Brown died, right?

 

[pats3in4]

Assani, I agree.

Very interesting write-up here:

When people talk about the 1985 Bears, everyone talks about their defense for good reason. They had an awesome front 7 and two great run-supporting and blitzing safeties. They would shut down running games and blitz the bejeesus out of QBs. A big part of their game was intimidation. Offenses fell apart when facing the Bears, often defeated mentally before the opening kickoff. So to beat this Bears team, you had to have a QB that wouldn't wilt under the heat. I think each of these teams had such QBs, at least for the years in question (e.g. Mark Rypien in 1991 was solid, the rest of his career notwithstanding). The next thing you needed were top-notch skill players that would force the Bears out of their 46 defense. This meant going with 3-wideouts (something not seen much in 1985, BTW - and also what Miami did in beating them as the Bears LBs couldn't cover Miami's extra wideouts). Mike Ditka himself said on a pregame show either last week or the week before that the 2007 Pats would have forced the Bears out of their 46 with their spread formations. I'm sure these other teams would have as well. Going with these three wideouts and forcing the Bears out of their 46 would have exposed the position I had yet to mention on that D...their very average cornerbacks. Tom Brady would beg the 1985 Bears to blitz all day if it meant Randy Moss is seeing single coverage by Mike Richardson. As would Montana with 1989 Jerry Rice (remember in 1985, Rice was a rookie with very questionable hands) or Aikman with Michael Irvin. These teams also had the offensive creativity and precise execution to keep that Bears blitz off balance with screens, especially to WRs. I think these teams would have forced the Bears to back off with the heat and play a more conventional D (as they were more than capable of as they proved under Vince Tobin in 1986 and actually were statistically better than the 1985 D). If teams these teams were successful in keeping the 46 blitz at bay as I expect, they would have also exposed another flaw in that D...the safeties' pass coverage skills. Duerson and Fencik couldn't stay with any of the TEs on these squads, let alone the 3rd WR and likely would have just had to play deep.

Let me ask you since you seem to have some good insight: Do you think the Dolphins of that year actually did match up well against the Bears and would've stood a solid shot at beating them in the SB had they got there?

I think a Bears/Dolphins rematch in SB20 would have gone Chicago's way. The reason is Miami's run D was done at the end of the year. The Pats ran for over 250 yards in the AFCCG. The week before, an 8-8 Cleveland team ran all over the Dolphins with Kevin Mack and Ernest Byner (you remember him, I'm sure) and almost pulled off the upset. Chicago would have run the ball down Miami's throat and kept the ball out of Marino's hands and probably would have won by 7 or 10.Having said that, I do think Miami would have been able to put up points, more than the 14 they put up against NE in the AFCCG. The Pats had a Pro Bowl CB in Raymond Clayborn who had an "All-Galaxy" performance against Mark Duper in that game...I used that term in quotes because that's what was used in the SI writeup of the game; It just stuck with me. It's true, Clayborn was awesome that day. Pro Bowl free safety Fred Marion, while nowhere the caliber of hitter like Duerson or Fencik, was better than either of them in coverage so the Pats had a secondary that matched up better vs. Miami than Chicago's did. I should also note that Miami turned the ball over 6 times that day, mostly on fumbles, which greatly contributed to their weak scoring output. In a much cleaner offensive game, they put up 30 on the Pats just a few weeks earlier so if they held onto the ball vs. Chicago, they'd probably finish somewhere between 24 and 30 points vs. them.

Going back to that MNF 38-24 win over the Bears, not only did Miami kill the 46 defense with Nat Moore eating up Chicago's LBs in coverage, they also used a rolling pocket to help give Marino time. Even when the Dolphins didn't roll the pocket, getting to Marino was tough because his pocket presence was amazing (Brady is probably today's closest comparison), he had the best pass-blocking center in history giving him a pocket to step up into (there's a reason Dwight Stephenson made the HOF despite playing less than 10 years) and his release was laser-quick. A lot went right that night for Miami to put up 38 (blocked punt, tipped ball caught for a TD), but even without those breaks I think Miami still scores more than the pathetic offenses Chicago faced that postseason.

 

[westbrook36]

Brown died shortly after that Super Bowl. He was just a monster on that defensive line. That defense was just loaded. Reggie White, Jerome Brown, Seth Joyner, Clyde Simmons, Wes Hopkins, Eric Allen, Andy Harmon, William Thomas, Byron Evans, and Andre Waters.

If Buddy Ryan had just cared about the offensive side of the ball at all, that team would have won multiple Super Bowls.

 

[redman]

Brown died shortly after that Super Bowl. He was just a monster on that defensive line. That defense was just loaded. Reggie White, Jerome Brown, Seth Joyner, Clyde Simmons, Wes Hopkins, Eric Allen, Andy Harmon, William Thomas, Byron Evans, and Andre Waters.

If Buddy Ryan had just cared about the offensive side of the ball at all, that team would have won multiple Super Bowls.

I agree, though I have some doubts about Randall Cunningham in the playoffs as I do with any scrambling QB who hasn't demonstrated a solid command of running a passing offense. That was definitely a championship caliber defense though, and only a modicum of additional offense, perhaps just a respectable running game to go with Cunningham's talents, might have been enough. The neglect of that line, the WR corps, and the RB's was borderline criminal given the talent on that defense. (BTW- if you put everything in bold, nothing is in bold, if you take my meaning.)